Focussing in the wrong places
"It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so." ~Mark Twain
“The past went that-a-way. When faced with a totally new situation, we tend always to attach ourselves to the objects, to the flavor of the most recent past. We look at the present through a rear view mirror. We march backwards into the future.” ~Marshall McLuhan
Many parents are worried about what marks their children get in school. They are afraid that their children will not get to learn enough if the child doesn’t get into a ‘one of the top schools’. Then they are afraid their child will not get to learn enough if the child doesn’t get into ‘one of the top classes’. If the child does get into one of the top classes, they next worry that the child doesn’t fall out of the top class. If that happens, it means the child is not learning enough. There is this constant fear that what we don’t know will get us into trouble.
The quote above by the famous writer Mark Twain tells us that we won’t get into trouble because we don’t know something. We usually get into trouble because we’re very sure we know something but then the thing we believe in turns out to be FALSE!
One of those false beliefs lies in paper derivatives of learning. Many people don’t realize the fact that the reason why learning has dropped to an all-time low is due to examinations and testing. The purpose of examinations is not to encourage learning but to determine what sort of worker each person will become based on how amenable they are to understanding and following instructions and repeating faithfully what they have been ordered to learn / do.
The nature of testing is such that every year has to reflect an incremental increase in scores or ‘productivity yield’, i.e. results. More often than not, actual ‘results’ will show fluctuations. One reason why less and less learning is happening is because the focus is on preparing for exams and not learning. In reality, most test results have to be adjusted downwards over time in order to continue showing an incremental increase in ‘yield’.
This is not so very different from the cost-cutting exercise employed by most manufacturers. People seem to know for sure that if they reduce costs here and there, it will certainly result in higher yield and wider profit margins. The higher profit margins and faster turnaround does not always reflect actual capacity but short-term adjustments to produce, at least on paper, incremental increases.
One of the worst food scares of this decade is the melanin in infant formula. Many people thought they knew for sure that the infant formula, biscuits and other products they find on shelves of stores are safe for consumption. But that just wasn’t so. And that’s an example of how we must be "activist" in questioning the assumptions we have made about life.
False Beliefs or Informed Truths?
Belief No. 1 : Getting good results in school tests and exams means my child is becoming more intelligent.
Listen to Howard Gardner - Professor of Cognition and Education at the Harvard Graduate School of Education . Here he talks about why standardized exams don't really measure anything. 
Belief No. 2 : Children shouldn't waste their childhood playing. They must make good use of their time to prepare to be an adult.
Stuart Brown on Why Play is Vital No Matter What Your Age.
Here's what Dr. Howard Gardner, considered the leading person in cognitive psychology and education, says in his latest book : 5 Minds for the Future.
"Accordingly, the challenge to the educator is to keep alive the mind and the sensibility of the young child. Artists and scientists have always known this: Pablo Picasso famously declared, “I used to draw like Raphael; it has taken my whole life to learn to draw like a child. “
He goes on, "But how to retain a childlike sensibility throughout life? So much depends on the messages that exist outside the walls of school and, for that matter, within the classrooms that serve the mass of children."
Why Pay More?
Belief No. 3 : If a child doesn't do well in school, she won't be able to get into university - get a job. Employers are looking for paper degrees.
It is worth taking a look at the situation in the U.S., UK, EU and even in Singapore and Malaysia. There can’t be enough high paying jobs if there aren’t that many people who are able to CREATE jobs and/or CREATE higher value (increase competitiveness) for their company.
Unfortunately, employers don’t are no longer willing to pay higher salaries for mere length of time spent in school or how much money spent on a piece of degree. Employees cannot justify asking for a higher salary on the basis of how well they have memorized and tested on standardized exams.
Employers pay for only one reason : The type of person you are (Who) and the value you can bring to the company. Value = Yield.
Belief No. 4: Schoolwork and learning is supposed to be boring, requiring lots of repetitive drills and memory work because it's supposed to prepare us for real-life where we spend a lifetime doing boring, meaningless, repetitive work.
Here’s what famed guru Stephen R. Covey (7 Habits of Highly Effective People) said in his book, “The Leader in Me.”
”…as a parent, grandparent and business leader, I do not want to hear that students are spending 20 percent of their time (one day per week) mastering irrelevance.”
”Today’s young people deserve better. Let us not rob them of their precious time. Let us not spend time on things that do not matter. As Goethe said, ”Things that matter most must never be at the mercy of that which matters least.”
"... So let us make room to teach skills and character traits that will help students navigate the 21st Century. If that means reconsidering some of the curriculum, then let that be the case.”
If we knew exactly what the future looked like for your children in 10-20 years’ time, would some of the things we’re doing now seem irrelevant, a waste of time, dull and making our children helpless in the future?
Belief No. 5 : University graduates make more money and have a better financial future.
The Rules of Work and the Rules of Money have changed. No one can actually spend a few years studying, get an award and then rest on their laurels for the rest of their life. That may be true 50 years ago but it is no longer true for any profession any more.
The Rules of Money
There are more graduates than there were 30 years ago. And they are all making less money. Robert Kiyosaki : "When I was young, people lived from paycheck to paycheck. Today, it seems like they live from credit card payment to credit card payment."
"Rich or poor, smart or not-so-smart, we all use money. Yet, while there are a few schools beginning to offer some financial education, it seems that most educators believe money isn't a subject worthy of the hallowed halls of our learning institutions." (Robert T. Kiyosaki on Yahoo Finance.)
Read about why even graduates are in financial trouble. The full article WHY THE RICH GET RICHER on Yahoo Financials here.
The Rules of Work has changed
Only the adaptable will survive. You must react to that change by being flexible and open to learning new skills. In this shifting world of work your current job can be considered as one route to gaining skills and knowledge in preparation for the next one. ~ Excerpt from the website of Kelly Services.
"A study by global workforce solutions leader Kelly Services finds that more than 80 percent of individuals surveyed are concerned that their current skill levels will not sustain them for more than five years. Almost half of the respondents say training currently provided by employers is not sufficient to enable them to upgrade their skills and advance their careers."
Read the entire article here .
For many people, there is an automatic response to want to blame the government. But we should all take responsibility for what is happening today. To do that, as Marshall McLuhan said, we have to stop driving with the rearview mirror. But the main decision makers of our children's futures, the parents, tend to make decisions for the future by looking at their own past.
We need to understand the events of the past that led to our current status quo instead of saying, “But that’s how the world is”. What worked in the past to usher us into the Industrial Revolution will not work for preparing our children for the 21st Century.
Ken Robinson :
We have no idea what our future is going to look like.......Education is meant to bring
us into a future we cannot grasp. Students starting school today (2006) will be retiring in 2065.
...the world is engulfed in a revolution.... Academic ability has come to dominate our view of intelligence. ...We can't afford to go on that way.
Degrees are now not worth anything and are a process of academic inflation. We need to radically rethink our view of intelligence.
The only way we can do this is by seeing our creative capacities for the richness they are and seeing children for the hope that they are. And our task is to educate for their whole being so they can face this future. We may not see this future, but they will. And our job is to help them make something of it.
Best-selling marketing guru, Seth Godin in his blog "Education at the Crossroads"
Should this be about school or about learning?
"School was the big thing for a long time. School is tests and credits and notetaking and meeting standards. Learning, on the other hand, is 'getting it'. It's the conceptual breakthrough that permits the student to understand it then move on to something else. Learning doesn't care about workbooks or long checklists.
For a while, smart people thought that school was organized to encourage learning. For a long time, though, people in the know have realized that they are fundamentally different activities."
Begin your journey as an Organic Learner.
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